Airport

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Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings

from High Flight by John Gillespie Magee, Jr. (1922-1941) sometimes Flight Lieutenant, Royal Canadian Air Force

6:30 P.M. - 8:30 P.M. (CST)

AT HALF-PAST SIX on a Friday evening in January, Lincoln International Airport, Illinois, was functioning, though with difficulty.

The airport was reeling---as was the entire Midwestern United States---from the meanest, roughest winter storm in half a dozen years. The storm had lasted three days. Now, like pustules on a battered, weakened body, trouble spots were erupting steadily.

A United Air Lines food truck, loaded with two hundred dinners, was lost and presumably snowbound somewhere on the airport perimeter. A search for the truck---in driving snow and darkness---had so far failed to locate either the missing vehicle or its driver.

United's Flight 111---a non-stop DC-8 for Los Angeles, which the food truck was to service---was already several hours behind schedule. The food snafu would make it later still. Similar delays, for varying reasons, were affecting at least a hundred flights of twenty other airlines using Lincoln International.

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